


ever fallen in love

by longituddeonda



Category: Narcos (TV)
Genre: American History, Angst, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Homophobia, Internalized Homophobia, LGBTQ Themes, Long Shot, NASA, Period-Typical Homophobia, but don't go into this thinking it's a romance, gay!javi, i guess, i really don't know how to tag this, it's majority platonic, lesbian!reader, space, they are together for some part of it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:54:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25511662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/longituddeonda/pseuds/longituddeonda
Summary: The two of you liked staring up at the stars. There was something about them. They were immortal, it seemed. People thousands of years ago would have been looking up at the same stars, using them to navigate the seas like your teacher told you in class last year. And you were looking up at the same stars millions of people had seen, and millions more would see. It was a shared experience for the two of you, something that made you feel part of something bigger.“What do you want to be when you grow up?” Javi asked.a documentation of javi and reader's relationship from when they're 13 to when they're 52. through childhood and dating, through falling apart to coming back together, through hating themselves to accepting who they are.
Relationships: Javier Peña & Reader, Javier Peña/Reader
Kudos: 10





	ever fallen in love

###  **april 1961**

The stars overhead had changed, seemingly overnight. Now, when Javi lay up on your roof with you, the giant dark wasn’t just a plane of flickering lights overhead, shining down onto earth like a blanket of comfort. Now, it was a three-dimensional space, navigable and full of adventures.

It was as if all the adventures hidden within your books, journeys to distant islands far away from Texas with plants that hadn’t been seen before and quests of flying fairies and fearsome monsters in an imaginary place, had been smashed together, creating some sort of new place that could be explored.

“Isn’t it crazy that just last week there was a man up there,” you said. 

“I don’t understand how it works,” Javi answered. He didn’t seem to understand much about science when you talked, but it was okay because you’d always explain it to him. It didn’t matter how long it took. The middle school science teachers didn’t support him much when he kept failing tests. But he was better than you at history and English anyway. 

“There was a rocket attached to the spaceship, and they launched him up there, just like all the animals. And there was oxygen and everything. Then the ship floated around the whole earth, in just an hour, before returning.”

“But how did it land?” Javi asked.

You didn’t know. That part wasn’t the exciting part. No. What was exciting was that there was a whole _person_ who was up there. That one day, you could be up there. It didn’t matter if the man was a Soviet. You were sure Americans would do the same sometime soon enough. 

“The thing fell back down to earth with a parachute,” you told Javi. That was all you remembered. 

“It’s incredible he’s still alive.”

“I hope he goes up again. Or someone else goes up,” you said. 

“Yeah. That would be impressive.” Javi said. 

You kept staring up at the stars. At some point, your parents would come to check in on the two of you and find you sitting outside of your room rather than going to sleep inside. But you didn’t care. 

The two of you liked staring up at the stars. There was something about them. They were immortal, it seemed. People thousands of years ago would have been looking up at the same stars, using them to navigate the seas like your teacher told you in class last year. And you were looking up at the same stars millions of people had seen, and millions more would see. It was a shared experience for the two of you, something that made you feel part of something bigger.

“What do you want to be when you grow up?” Javi asked. 

“I don’t know. I can’t really see myself as a grown-up. They all have these boring jobs.”

“I’d like to be a firefighter. But dad says they don’t make a lot of money and I’d be better helping him out on the ranch.”

“Really?”

“Yeah,” Javi said. There was a little bit of sadness in his voice. “Well, he didn’t say it exactly like that. But I know that’s what’s going to happen. Rafael is leaving this year for college and Martín’s already there. They’re gonna get good jobs, and no one will be left to help on the ranch.”

“But you can go to college too,” you said. “You don’t have to let that stop you.”

“I don’t know if I want to go to college. I hate school. More school doesn’t sound fun.”

“I think you’d be a good chef,” you said. “You like cooking with your dad, and you’re really good at it.”

“You think I’d wear those ugly hats?” Javi spat out with disbelief. You giggled.

“Yeah,” you said. “You’d look stupid but I’d still come to your restaurant every day.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” You smiled.

“You know, you’re good at school. Maybe you’d be a good scientist. You could work in a lab or something.”

You thought about it. Maybe that would be fun. Scientists were cool. They had those big lab coats and they made all sorts of colorful things in glass tubes. But you kept staring up at the sky and the answer was looking back at you. “I think it would be fun to be like Yuri Gagarin. I’d like to walk up amongst the stars.”

###  **may 1966**

The storage closet at your high school was not the ideal place to be doing this. Your pale blue dress had a skirt a little too big and Javi had pulled off the gloves you had been complaining about all night long and they were being held between your two chests, ready to fall to the dirty cement should you separate. His arms were wrapped around your back, not low enough to be encircling your waist or hips, but not high enough to be grasping your shoulders. It was more than a little awkward.

You hadn’t even figured out what to do with your own arms. And you should have been good at it. The two of you had been doing this for a year and a half now. You had lost your virginity together nearly a year ago. It should have been comfortable. 

And yet, the two of you with your mouths pressed together, your tongue daring to dive into Javi’s mouth, you didn’t particularly enjoy it. 

The way the other girls talked about making out with their boyfriends, you knew what it should have been like. But part of you wrote it off. Maybe they all said it was good, distracting, all-consuming, and perfect, but they felt the same as you and lied about it. Maybe all girls didn’t find much excitement in it. 

All you knew was that often, while making out with Javi was good and everything, your mind would wander. You’d be there physically, but your mind was often going over your chemistry homework or thinking about going off to college. 

You didn’t dare tell Javi.

The Peña’s were close friends with your family, and you and Javi were even closer. Growing up, you had learned to ride bikes together and were the first person the other would put on every list of people to invite to a birthday party. And best friends were okay for a boy and a girl in elementary school, but as soon as you reached junior high people had started teasing the two of you. But you had survived even that. Somewhere along the line, though, you had drifted away a bit, and only returned to one another when he asked you out. 

If you told Javi you weren’t feeling much when you did stuff like this, it wouldn’t just be the end of your relationship. It very well might be the end of your entire friendship. You couldn’t hurt him like that. Not when he cared about you. 

Javi pulled away and the change pulled you out of your thoughts. You reached in between your bodies to grab the gloves, holding them in a hand as you pushed away from him. 

“This isn’t really the best place to do this,” you said. “My dress is a little too big and it’s dirty.”

“Want to get out of here?” he asked. 

No. You didn’t. You wanted to go back into the gym and dance. Something you actually enjoyed doing with Javi. 

“Sure,” you said. 

While sneaking out of the dance and into the hallways of the high school was easy, sneaking back into the dance would be harder. So Javi led you out one of the back hallways, and the two of you burst out onto the field. 

From there, it was easy to run around the building and over to the parking lot, but neither of you wanted to get into a car and drive somewhere. There wasn’t much of anywhere to go in Laredo.

Javi fished out his pack of cigarettes and a lighter from his pocket and handed you one. Another thing you did because Javi liked it. But you weren’t even sure if he smoked cause he liked it, or if he did it because everyone else did. Maybe that was the case. The two of you walked alongside the field and out the back corner of the school property onto a hardly used street. 

It was quiet. 

That was the nice thing about you and Javi. You had known each other for so damn long you could be quiet together.

You were going to graduate soon. That was a scary thought. Even scarier was that you’d be moving away from Javi. He was going to be staying in Laredo, working on the ranch with his dad. You, however, were driving 6 hours away to attend the University of Houston. 

It was exciting. Houston was everything you had dreamed of. It was home to NASA’s Manned Spacecraft center and you knew things were only starting to get exciting. Just earlier that year, you had obsessed over any information you could get about Luna 9, the Soviet’s successful landing on the moon. Your parents had gotten concerned about your interest in the USSR earlier in high school and since then you had to keep any excitement a secret. But you were fascinated by any advancements. Living in Houston would put you right near where people were doing incredible things. 

You hoped they’d put a man up there. On the moon.

You looked up at the sky. Your dream of one day getting to go up in space seemed a little bit closer. You imagined looking down at the earth would be both horrifying and liberating. To be further away from the world than any person before. To look down and see the land holding millions of people, all within a single line of sight. 

But that was nerve-wracking too. To do that, you’d have to first figure out how to move away from Laredo. As much as you wanted to leave, Javi wouldn’t be coming with you. And you couldn’t fathom losing your best friend. 

###  **december 1972**

The Peña’s house had been a second home to you growing up. So many nights had been spent there, so many family dinners and holidays. Martín, Javi’s oldest brother, had moved to Houston after graduating and even his home had become a little respite while you were in your first years of college. The familiarity of it all was comforting. 

That had all changed, of course, when you broke up with Javier and Martín had blamed you for the pain it caused his brother. At least for a couple years. 

Now, in the later stages of obtaining your master’s degree, you still occasionally went over. He had gotten married, had a little boy and another was on the way. It didn’t compare though, to whenever you returned to Laredo for a night or two to visit your family. That always included a meal with the Peñas.

Before you had broken up with Javi, those visits included little trysts out on the ranch, far from any family. They were quick and hard and you weren’t sure if either of you wanted it anymore. After the breakup, Javi didn’t even show up. And you had only seen him a few times since. It was the sort of familiarity one would have with a student in high school with whom one shared no classes nor friends with but might nod at while passing in the hall. 

It had caused you enough distress over the years.

But this was the first time you were for more than a week since you left Laredo those years ago. 

It was Christmas break, and you usually would come back for the actual date before returning to your part-time job and classes but you managed to take off a whole three weeks this year and had arrived the night before. 

Chucho was in the kitchen finishing up the food and you were alongside him helping. Years before, it would have been Javi in there cooking. 

Except no one knew where Javi was. He had said he’d be there. 

You helped Chucho take the food out to the two tables set up inside. Not only were your parents there, but Martín and his family, and Rafael Peña, Javi’s other brother, were present along with Chucho’s brother, wife, and two kids. It was a great crowd, everyone catching up with one another. Only your parents and Chucho had seen each other recently, so conversation just about what everyone was doing and what had happened in the last year dominated the first hour or two since you arrived, and lasted well into the meal. 

The door opened about fifteen minutes in and Javier was rushing in, panting a bit. “Sorry I’m late, I lost track of time,” he blurted out.

Chucho happily welcomed him in and gestured to the place he had set out for his son, and Javi took off his coat and sat down. 

The conversation continued without much of a pause, but you kept looking at Javi. It had been a long time. And while no one seemed to care where he had been, you knew.

It was a familiar look on his face: the one he had after making out with you. A bit of awe and a bit of confusion, maybe discomfort. But a lot of contentment as well. The thought of Javi off somewhere, behind a bar making out with some girl, possibly even a girlfriend, somehow made you a bit sick. You didn’t ever dream of dating him again, but knowing he had a whole life without you, one where there were girls he was close to and people he cared about. That didn’t feel good.

You thought back to your first time together. That night, tucked into the covers of Javier’s bed, just down the hallway from where you were sitting now, you had had a realization you knew would change everything. All those years of thinking _things_ about girls? That was a lot more real than you wanted it to be. And it wasn’t just that you didn’t want things with Javi. You didn’t want it with any man. 

Javi had already drifted off to sleep but your eyes stayed open for hours, memorizing the shape of a single crack in the plaster ceiling. You were terrified. And there wasn’t anyone to tell.

It took you until your second year of college to break it off with Javi. The long-distance thing wasn’t working well for either of you, as you spent many of your breaks on trips with the Geology department and took internships and research opportunities all summer long. And you were able to admit to yourself you couldn’t force yourself to date a man any longer. Even if that man was your best friend. 

That night when you were back for your father’s birthday, one weekend in the spring of 1968, you had met up with Javier like you always did, and instead of going back to the ranch with him, you told him it was no longer working. That the two of you couldn’t keep pushing something that wasn’t going to last. You knew Javi had been losing interest in the relationship too, but he was still devastated. He had cried and you had hugged him for a few minutes before he pushed you away. There wasn’t much mourning for you to do. You were losing a friend, but one that had already grown distant. You knew for Javi it meant so much more. And you still felt bad about it. 

Your mom started talking about you and nudged your side as a cue to get involved in the conversation. You ripped your eyes from Javi, who was still staring at his plate and eating quietly.

“She’s doing incredible,” your mom said. “She already has a job lined up for when she gets her degree in the next few months, right?”

“Yes,” you nodded. “After my internship with NASA in their planetary research department, I’ve been able to use their facilities to help with some of the university research. And I’ll be working as a Planetary Geologist there when I graduate.”

“That’s incredible,” Rafael said. “What do they even do there?”

“We study the geology of the planets, research how they were formed and their history. The Mariner program has been sending up probes, Mariner 9 just completed its mission around Mars and I assume we’ll still be looking into much of that for the next year.”

Nearly everyone got excited about the whole thing. Space exploration was one of those topics most people loved hearing about. But you looked over at Javi and he was staring back at you. And in that moment, you wanted the world to open up and swallow you. 

Javier had always been jealous of you. You had gotten to go to college right after high school, no longer stuck in Laredo. He had wanted to get away just as much as you. 

It didn’t feel right to be talking about all your success in front of him. 

Thankfully, after answering some questions about the Pioneer mission shooting out past the asteroid belt and the men on the moon, people moved onto excitement over Rafael’s announcement that he had a girlfriend.

By the time dinner was over, you had moved into the living room to play with Javi’s little cousins, the 10-year-old Danny and 7-year-old Nicolas. 

The rest of the adults were still talking in the dining room, but Javier wandered in, led by Martín’s kid, Lucas. 

“Hey,” he said. 

You looked up. The three kids joined together and ran off to the toy bin Chucho kept in the corner for his nephews and grandson. Javi sat down on the couch. You stayed sitting on the floor.

“Hi,” you said. Time had softened the awkwardness between you, but it had never disappeared. “What have you been up to lately?”

“I, um, I’m actually attending Texas A&I, up in Kingsville. Majoring in Psychology,” he said.

“Oh.” You had no idea. “When did you start?”

“Three years ago,” he said. 

“Wow, I didn’t—” you started. But you didn’t want to finish the sentence. You didn’t know a damn thing about him anymore. “I’m really happy for you, I hope you’re enjoying it.”

You truly meant it. 

“We’re heading home,” your mom said, popping her head into the living room. “Want to come back with us now? Or will someone drive you home?” She looked pointedly at Javi. 

You shook your head. You would _not_ be having Javi drive you home. “Just give me a second,” you told her. “I’ll be right behind you.”

She went back to grab her things and you turned back to Javi.

“Goodbye?” you said, taking a deep breath. 

“Yeah, goodbye.” He said. It was nice to talk to him, even if it didn’t have much meaning. And you were happy for his presence. 

“I’ll, um, see you around I guess,” you said. “I’m back for another couple weeks.”

“Right.” He didn’t seem to care. You figured you deserved that. It wasn’t like you were in the business of seeing each other much anymore. 

You started walking towards the front door but before leaving the living room you paused and turned around. “Javi?”

“Yeah?”

“I hope you like her, whoever she is,” you said. You knew he would understand exactly what you were talking about. “You deserve someone great.”

You didn’t include the implied, _unlike me._ Maybe he wouldn’t catch that though. Not that you could explain it. He deserves someone who liked girls. Who wasn’t some messed up lesbian. 

He looked nervous, like you had discovered something not meant to be known. You flashed him the smile you had shared with him so many times growing up. _I’m not going to tell a damn soul._

You missed dating him, you supposed. It might have felt wrong, but it was better than this. 

###  **august 1976**

The church where you and Javi had grown up attending Christmas and Easter masses was now filled to the brim with his family and friends, and those of Lorraine. You were seated on a hard wooden pew in between one of Javi’s friends from the Kingsville Police Department and Charlie, a high school friend of the two of you. He had been asking you about how you could attend Javi’s wedding when you were his ex. 

You didn’t have the energy to explain that over the past four years you had grown closer again, salvaging the bits of your friendship that could be saved, and scrapping the rest. There had been an important afternoon where the two of you had driven halfway between your homes to meet in Victoria and over drinks, you had both admitted you hadn’t ever been good as a couple. And that was it. 

It was still hard to figure out how to be friends, but the switch was tangible. You went from talking about the weather to spilling your fears to one another. 

And now you were sitting in a church, waiting for Javi to show up and marry his girlfriend of two years. 

Lorraine was sweet. She worked at a bank in Kingsville and Javi had been excited to tell you he was dating her. She was from Laredo too, from the other end of town. She had attended a different high school and was just one year behind you and Javi. 

You had hosted them a couple times in your house in Houston, and the couple seemed perfect. You were happy Javi had someone to be with, someone who was attentive to who Javi was. And you had noticed since their relationship began, your friendship with him had strengthened. You thought it was because she helped him get over whatever hurt was leftover from the vestiges of your years in high school.

August in Laredo was always hot, and being in a church with minimal air conditioning as people were starting to crowd in was not something you enjoyed. You were watching people sit down around you when someone showed up at the end of your own pew, leaning over Charlie. It was Rafael, dressed up in one of the nice groomsmen suits. 

“Hey, Javi wants to see you, can you come back?” he asked. His eyes were wide, desperate for you. 

You nodded. “Yeah,” you said. You stood up and shuffled over Charlie, clutching your purse in your hand. Rafael walked towards the side door of the church. His wide stride had you jogging behind him to keep up. 

At the room where Javi was supposed to be getting ready, all the groomsmen had been kicked out and Rafael had just pointed you in. “He doesn’t want to talk to anyone else.”

You pushed open the door. Javi was pacing back and forth, and only looked up at you when you cleared your throat. 

“You’re here,” he exhaled.

“Yeah,” you said. Standing still next to Javi made you feel frozen. He was visibly nervous. His whole body was almost vibrating. You sat on one of the stiff chairs scattered about, and then told him, “Sit down.” 

He stopped where he was, and looked at you, and at the seat you were pointing at. It took a moment, like he was processing it, but he sat facing you.

His leg started bouncing. You put a hand out to hold it down, knowing how he sometimes got. Touch was grounding for him. He took a deep breath and looked up at you.

“It’s going to be fine, Javi,” you said. He still hadn’t said a word about what was wrong. 

“I don’t know.” He shook his head. 

“What did you need me here to talk about?” you asked.

“I don’t think I can do it.”

“What?” you said. “You don’t think you can get married? You’ve been dating Lorraine for a couple years. You love her. You’ve moved in together. What’s stopping you?”

“I don’t—” he started. Javi looked away from you, up at the ceiling. You weren’t sure if you were the person to help with any sort of wedding jitters, but you were one of Javi’s best friends. So you had to be there for him. He looked back at you, and the eye contact this time was different. He looked afraid. “I can’t do it because I’m…”

Javi trailed off. 

“Because you’re what?” You ask.

“Never mind,” he said. “I think I need you to distract me. It’s just nerves.”

You weren’t convinced. You hadn’t seen Javi that shaken ever before. He looked like he was maybe getting sick, and there was so much written across his face but you didn’t have the skill to read it.

Still, you nodded. 

He asked you why you didn’t bring a plus one. He said the last time he and Lorraine were at your place in Houston, they noticed someone else’s shoes. Javi had assumed you were dating someone.

It was your turn to be elusive. 

You _did_ have someone you could have brought. But it didn’t once cross your mind to bring her. Your family didn’t even know you were gay, let alone the rest of Laredo that would be at the wedding. It wasn’t the time nor place for you to come out. You weren’t even sure if there’d ever be a right moment with your hometown.

“There’s no one, Javi,” you said. “I’m still as single as ever.”

Javi managed to huff out a laugh. 

“Tied to your work, right?” He asked. “You and your space obsession.”

“Yep,” you grinned. “Me and my space obsession.” 

You had been lying to Javi since you were sixteen about your sexuality, it had become second nature. To switch topics so smoothly no longer made you feel bad.

“Anything interesting up there?”

“We just got some data sent back from the Viking lander,” you said. Adding after seeing his look of confusion, “From Mars. The research teams, mine included, designed some tests to detect signs of life in the soil, if there’s any. The first lander recently touched down, and the second craft just hit orbit, but the lander won’t be down on the surface for a bit.”

“So you’re trying to see if there’s life up there?” His voice sounded smaller than usual, awe interlaced with reminiscence. 

“Yeah. Or if there ever was.”

Someone knocked on the door and one of the groomsmen entered. It was time for Javi to head out. 

You returned to your seat, settling in as the ceremony began to kick off. 

When Lorraine walked down the aisle you smiled. Four years ago you would have felt jealous. Maybe even angry. Even though you knew you didn’t like Javi like that, part of you then thought you’d end up marrying a man anyway. And if it was Javi, that would be the best option you could imagine. You would have liked to be the woman wearing such a beautiful gown, walking up to an amazingly kind person. 

Except now, you knew that could never happen. You would rather die alone than marry a man. 

The bulk of the ceremony wasn’t particularly interesting. The priest spoke for a while, and a couple people went up to recite the readings. It dragged on a bit longer than it should have, and everyone was starting to sweat with the August Texan heat. 

Then the vows started. 

“Please face each other as you declare these vows before God and in the presence of your family and friends,” the officiant began.

“Wait,” Javi said, loud enough to be heard by anyone in the sanctuary. “I can’t do this. I’m sorry, Lorraine.”

He shook his head and your eyes were glued to him. This was a sort of spontaneity you hadn’t ever seen from him, and a betrayal of his own loyalty to those he loved. Your stomach dropped. What the hell was happening?

He took a step away from Lorraine, down the aisle. “Lorraine, you’re an amazing person, and you deserve someone so much better. But this isn’t going to work out.”

You could tell Lorraine hadn’t even processed what was happening until Javier was pushing the front doors to the church open. And it didn’t matter what people thought, you weren’t there to find out how she reacted. You were already rushing towards Javi, Chucho close behind. 

The heavy church doors swung open into the bright sunlight and you caught little more than Javi’s car, screeching out of the parking lot and down the road.

You stood on the front steps, Chucho beside you, out of breath. You had no idea where he was going, and you weren’t sure if it was a good idea to search for him. When Javi wanted to be left alone, it was best to respect that. 

###  **february 1979**

The apartment in Laredo that Javi had moved into after the disaster of his own wedding was in a little, run-down, two-story apartment building and you were spending the weekend on his couch. There wasn’t much to do in Laredo anymore. Not for you nor for Javi. 

You had moved on to the bigger city and a job that put you in the heart of everything, and Javi was an outsider himself too. Ever since he left Lorraine, no one in town had ever come to respect him the way they used to. He still transferred from the Kingsville Police Department to the Laredo one, and within a year was working instead for the DEA, managing drug trafficking across the border. He had told you, more than once, that not only did the people make Laredo no longer feel like home, the town itself did too. 

It had changed a lot since you were kids. There weren't many exciting things to do that you didn’t associate with some of the painful parts of your latter years of dating one another. And going out to a bar usually ended up including conversations with people you had long hoped to leave behind. It was so much easier to have days like this: splayed out on the floor of Javi’s apartment, the radio on, a couple bottles of whatever he had on hand, and playing cards. The two of you could talk for hours.

This weekend was different, however. It was your last one with him. 

Javi had called you a few months back, letting you know he had taken up the DEA’s offer to start working at various embassies around the world. He was leaving in a month, and you weren’t going to be able to see him off. 

Voyager 1 was about to make its Jupiter flyby, and you needed and wanted to be back in Houston for the potential discoveries. 

So he had invited you down for this weekend, the last one you were sure to be available.

You had left his apartment four times since you arrived on Friday evening: for groceries, for a run Saturday morning before it got too hot, for dinner that night with Chucho, and then this morning to visit your parents.

You didn’t have much more time left with Javi. And while it might have sounded feasible to call him all the time, international calls weren’t going to be easy. You weren’t sure when you’d get to see him again, or even hear him.

Tomorrow morning, there would be a solar eclipse. Some of your friends from work were driving all the way up to some of the Northern states, like Oregon and Montana. One of the scientists you were in contact with at the Jet Propulsion Lab had even asked if you wanted to join the team doing research on the atmospheric effects of the eclipse. It was the first time you had declined such an exciting offer. You were more than content with the idea of sitting in the parking lot of the complex at 9:30 in the morning, watching a partial eclipse with Javi before you drove back to Houston and he went off to work. 

It would be a great way to send each other off. 

You placed down three cards in front of you and discarded another, signaling it was Javi’s turn, and then put your hand face down on the floor. You reached over to the bottle of tequila he had next to him and brought it to your lips. 

It was a comfortable 70 degrees outside, but the air was still and Javi’s apartment was always a furnace. There was a fan pointed at the two of you, the white noise of which helped drown out how much this was already hurting. You were going to miss Javi like hell. You had had him, and you lost him, and then you had him again. And even though you didn’t talk much, even though you kept plenty of secrets from him, and you assumed he did too, Javi was still the one person you trusted more than anyone else. 

You had gone through a rough breakup a few months ago. You had been with her for almost four years and thought you were going to spend the rest of your life with her. Sometimes, you looked at him and you thought about your relationship over the years, and you thought it would be so easy to just come out to him. He’d be the first person from your childhood that would know. And you wanted him to be the first. But you weren’t sure if he would react well. You didn’t want to risk this. 

Javi played his turn and you drew a card from the pile. An 8. Not helpful. You discarded it and took another swig of the tequila. Maybe a little too much, and the sting at the back of your throat almost had you coughing. 

Your parents told you this morning that Ariana, one of your friends from high school, had gotten married a month ago. Charlie, the kid who used to smoke behind the bleachers and talk about how much he hated all the girls who cared about football games and school dances had even gotten married to Elizabeth Escartín, the prom queen during your senior year. It seemed like everyone was paired off now.

Everyone except you and Javi. 

It made sense for you. There was no way you could even get married if you had someone. It wasn’t legal. Not only that, but it was also a crime to go outside holding hands with your girlfriend. 

“Javi?” you asked.

“Yeah?”

“Why did you leave Lorraine?” Nearly three years, and you hadn’t ever asked him. You thought he’d come to you with the reason when he felt like it. But it had been weighing you down. It didn’t make any sense. He and Lorraine seemed a perfect match.

He set down his cards and looked up at you. He took a deep breath and the look in his eyes was the same one he had before the wedding. You hadn’t seen it since then. 

“I… uh… there was someone else,” he said. “And I didn’t love her. At least, not as much as I should have.”

“Oh.” You didn’t know what else to say. Someone else? It didn’t seem like him at all. “Is there still someone else?”

You didn’t want to hear the answer. Something about it would have been too hard to cope with, and you weren’t sure why. 

Still, Javi shook his head. “No. Hasn’t been for a long time. I’m just a shitty person I guess. I don’t belong with anyone. I don’t deserve anyone.”

He was so wrong. He deserved so much. But you knew he wouldn’t want to hear your protest. He grabbed the bottle of whiskey on the other side of him and the glass he had been sipping out of. The sound of the liquid pouring into the vessel was louder than anything else in the room. 

###  **june 1986**

Colombia was everything Javier thought he needed. It was away from Laredo, away from the people he had disappointed, away from the people he kept keeping secrets from. And he had a job that occupied his mind enough to keep himself from spiraling too much. 

He was pretty sure if he hadn’t left when he did, he might not have made it to 1980. 

Javier had come thinking it might somehow fix him. But as he sat down at the bar, nursing a glass of whiskey for the tenth consecutive day, he found himself eyeing the guy who had just sat down at the other end of the bar. 

He hated it. He hated himself. 

Colombia hadn’t fixed things. It just made it easier to pretend nothing was wrong and call up the brothel for yet another night of trying to fuck himself straight. 

To his credit, he didn’t for a second give these women any less than they deserved. He had gotten good at figuring out how to make sure they had a good time, even better than he had been with Lorraine and you and the few other women in his life who had solidified he was _wrong_. 

He tilted his head back, downing the rest of his drink, and then pulled out his wallet. He shuffled some bills around and paid for his drink. It took an incredible effort to push the man’s face out of his head, however beautiful and tempting he was. But Javier managed to leave the establishment and push himself out onto the streets. He hadn’t driven to the bar, anticipating enough alcohol running through his system, and as he walked down the street back to his apartment, he let the cool air calm him down.

The problem was that it was too quiet and the voice in his head was too loud. It kept giving conflicting messages: that he had to stop trying to ignore things, that he needed to just keep calling up prostitutes and they’d fix him, that he was a horrible person, that his brain was messed up, that maybe he wasn’t messed up. That he should call Freckles. Again. For the fifth night in a row. 

He couldn’t do it. Not only did he suspect the women there were already getting suspicious that he had no life, but he knew Steve would start to ask questions too. 

Javier’s damn partner who had come to Bogotá with his wife and one month of elementary Spanish from Miami had somehow wormed his way into becoming what resembled friendship. 

Steve couldn’t ever compare to the one person Javier actually considered a friend, but he was pretty damn good. He knew about Javier’s habits, but he would still get concerned if it was happening a little too often. So, stumbling alone into his apartment, Javier collapsed on the couch. He wasn’t sure if it was going to be one of those nights where he’d just fall asleep there in his regular clothes, or if he’d somehow manage to scrape himself up and into the bedroom. 

He reached over to turn on the lamp, lighting up the contents of the end table. And right there, illuminated, was the folded up pieces of paper he had kept reading, over and over again, since he received them from you nearly three weeks ago. 

He picked them up and unfolded the letter.

_Dear Javier,_

_It’s been quite a few months. I’m sorry for not writing in a while, it’s been really crazy with work lately. And I’m sure you probably already know about some of it._

_Back in January, Voyager made its flyby of Uranus, and we were getting all these amazing photos of the moons. And then Challenger blew up. That day is sort of frozen in my mind. I had taken the morning off and was watching from behind Mission Control at the Space Center. It was exciting to see another manned flight go up, and those few seconds from when it took off and when it blew up on the screen were stretched out infinitely. I felt my stomach drop only as the shuttle was falling back down to earth, and I realized that there were people in there. And I didn’t know if they had died._

_I didn’t know any of them, but I knew people who did. The astronauts trained here. I probably saw them in the halls or the parking lot. Things quickly were set into motion and I retreated back to the labs. I couldn’t really do anything to help. I’m not part of those teams. It still sucked._

_Everything has been different since that. I don’t know if we’re ever going to send people back up there. I mean, I think a lot of us want to. And there’s a lot of talk about how to do it safely. But everyone’s so scared._

_Halley’s comet flew by. I had been anticipating it for months but the STS-51-L mission was supposed to be up there observing it and instead, when it was most visible in the sky, people were diving into the ocean and finding their bodies. It didn’t really feel right._

_I absorbed myself in work on Uranus’ moons, but have mostly been working on two major projects. I’m doing long-term research about Mars, its history, and potential life, and have been helping design plans for future launches. I’ve been to the Jet Propulsion Lab a bunch to talk about proposed tests and work with engineers. It’s fascinating, really. And I’m working on the Magellan mission. It’s a probe we’re hoping to send to Venus in a few years, and it will hopefully map and image most of the surface of the planet. And I’ve been particularly working on designing how we’re going to research the geological structure of it._

_It sounds cool and all, but I haven’t really been able to appreciate any of it as much as I used to. It's all been shrouded by the loss of Challenger. NASA’s all under fire too, about secrecy and the press and stuff. I feel a bit guilty saying it, but I’m glad me, my team, and my department aren’t caught up in it all. Still, the environment here is weird._

_I guess in other news, I met someone a while ago. I didn’t tell you about it in the last letter cause I wasn’t sure if it was going to last. But they’ve moved in with me. It’s been a little wild to have such a lovely and exciting romantic life at home and then go off to work in such a somber place._

_I know I’m probably not supposed to say things like this, but I really hope I’m still with them when you get back. I want you to meet_ ~~_her_ ~~ _them._

That’s as far as Javier read. It stopped him the first time he read it through, and he made it past that on the second read. But never since then. He knew what the rest of the letter contained: information about Chucho, Rafael, and Martín and his family. But none of that mattered to Javier.

He was just fixated on the one sentence: _I want you to meet_ ~~ _her_~~ _them._

The word was scribbled out, enough that if one were to read it quickly enough they wouldn’t be able to tell what was underneath. But if they paused long enough, there were the clear remnants of a word. One that had far deeper implications than Javier could even begin to ponder. He was still caught up, three weeks later, on the idea that you would even think to write that. 

Maybe tonight was the night to write back, Javier thought. He wasn’t going to mention anything about the slip-up. And the more he thought about it, the more he wasn’t even sure if he was seeing it right. There was no way you could be messed up like him. It would have been easier to just forget about it, But you deserved a response. 

###  **july 1995**

You pulled into the driveway of Chucho’s ranch and Javier got out of the car before you even put it into park. You leaned back to grab your backpack from the seat behind you before jumping out and joining Javier on the cement. He had already popped open the trunk and pulled out his single suitcase.

It was weird, meeting him at the airport in Houston. He had been living abroad for years, and yet only had one bag of things. He had smiled upon seeing you and you joined him in a hug that lasted long enough for someone to make a snide comment about couples being too public with their affection. The two of you had laughed it off. 

Your partner was off on a business trip for the week and you had agreed to drive Javier back to Laredo after he quit the DEA and returned to Texas. It somehow felt more than ever, keeping it a secret from him. That after all these years, he was still your closest friend, and you were his. Despite everything you had been through, it had always been the two of you colliding back together, time and time again. It was as if everything was screaming at you to just come out to Javi. Like you _had_ to.

And yet you had never talked about the subject even once with him. 

You were scared he would reject you.

Chucho met the two of you outside, giving Javi a big hug before giving you one as well. It had been a while since you had seen him, and Chucho was practically your second father at this point. 

You let the father and son catch up as you went inside to set your overnight backpack down in the guest bedroom. It was late enough in the afternoon that driving back would get you home rather late, and you wanted to spend some time with Javier. It had been over 15 years since you got to see him, narrowly missing him when he came back for Danny’s wedding a while back when you were stuck at work finishing up reports on some images Hubble had sent back. 

As one of the main scientists researching Mars and Venus, things had settled down a bit in the past few months. Not as much data was coming back, and you could afford to take a little break. 

You had even spent a few weeks working support for the group studying Saturn’s moons, just because of how much things had slowed.

It was almost comical how you and Javier fell right back into step with one another. He was different from when he left, he seemed to hate Laredo and the people there less, and himself a little bit more, and it hurt to see. But he was quick to smile at your jokes and before you knew it, you were communicating through short glances and a quirk of the lips while singing along to the radio on your drive. 

It made dinner with Chucho that much easier. 

After the sunset, you and Javi were left alone downstairs after Chucho went to sleep as he woke up before 5am without fail. The two of you sat on the back porch of the house, him on one of the low adirondacks, and you on the swinging bench, your legs stretched out across the length of it allowing you to be facing Javi. 

It was quiet outside, only the wind rushing through the grass, the distant call of quails, and the soft creaking of the chains on the bench could be heard as you swung back and forth. 

You looked up at the stars. The way you did so had changed so much over the years, you now looked up with this tangibility. You had touched the soil from the moon, everything up there was real.

“You know, just a couple days ago, two amateur observers discovered a comet. Hale-Bopp. It's going to pass by in a year. And it’s gonna be bright. You’ll be able to see it from your backyard,” you said.

“I missed this,” Javier said.

“Missed what?”

He let out a little huff of laughter. “You, talking about space. Even when we were little kids, you dumbed it down for me and I would understand it better than any teacher who tried to talk about it.”

“I’m not dumbing it down,” you said. You weren’t. Javier was far from dumb. “I’m only telling you stuff you’d find interesting, and not scaring you off with numbers and shit.”

“I—” he started to protest, but he relaxed back into his chair, seemingly not wanting to get into it. Or that he didn’t have a valid argument. “Thank you, though. I don’t think there was ever anyone else until college who didn’t make me feel like an idiot for not understanding things. You always patiently waited, explained stuff, things I didn’t get.”

“Javi,” you breathed out. The only one? You thought back to high school, to all the times when he had broken down on Chucho’s kitchen counter next to you over his Physics homework, and how when you’d stay after class to morally support him when he asked for help from a teacher, only to watch them brush Javi off or tell him to pay more attention in class. 

And if he had to wait until he attended college to get the support he got from you? Then there was a year where he had no one. After you broke his heart. 

You didn’t ever find out if he had gotten over that or not. Part of you always wondered if he still held an interest in you all these years, and just respected your boundaries enough to sit back and let it be. You were damn lucky to have him as a friend.

“30 years ago we actually dated,” you said. Maybe it was the quiet emptiness of the night, but something made you brave enough to venture into this unspoken territory. “I forget about that sometimes.”

“Damn,” Javi said. “Was it really that long ago?”

“Almost.”

“We were different people back then.”

You nodded. “I’m sorry. I don’t think I’ve ever really told you that.”

“Sorry for what?”

“For breaking up with you. I know we meant a lot to one another. It was hard to think I was losing you as a friend too. And I didn’t want to hurt you, but I ended up doing it anyway.”

“No, you don’t need to apologize,” he said. He turned away, looking out into the field. “I’m actually glad we broke up when we did. It hurt like hell, yeah, but we wouldn’t have lasted. If we waited any longer, I think we might have ruined any chance of us still being friends.” 

He was right. You had thought about that over and over again. But to hear he thought about it too? It quelled a lot of anxiety you didn’t know you still held. 

“You don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to,” you said, taking a shaky inhale. It was something you had wondered a lot in the years where you were starting to rekindle your friendship but had always been too scared to ask. “But, do you regret it? Us? Dating?”

He shook his head. “Hell no. It happened and it’s part of us now. I think I learned more about you because of it. And I can’t regret that.”

“Do you regret losing our virginity to one another?” you blurted out, your hand flying up to your mouth. You hadn’t meant to say that. 

He didn’t answer for a while. You swallowed. Just as you were about to apologize, try to take it back, and change the topic, he spoke.

“I don’t _regret_ it,” he said. “And for what it was, it was fine. But, and I don’t mean this in any way to offend you, I didn’t really like it.”

“I didn’t either,” you said. It was something you never thought you’d tell him, but it felt amazing to say it.

“Oh.”

Shit. Maybe he didn’t want to hear that. 

“Javi, it wasn’t that it was _bad_ . It was actually good,” you said. Yeah, you had orgasmed. And yeah, he was _good_ at it. But you didn’t derive any sort of arousal from the thought of him. It was sort of mindless. “I’m glad it was you. If it had been anyone else, I probably would have hated them.”

“Why?” Javi asked. 

You took a deep breath. You knew what you had to say. And you knew it was the time to say it. You were just still so afraid of what he would say. 

“I’m a lesbian, Javi.” Your next breath was shaky and you were sure he could hear that. Anticipatory tears had already started to well up. “If it had been someone else, I would have resented them for being involved in that moment. Because I think I knew before, but I didn’t really accept it until then. And I was scared. I had been so afraid that—” you couldn’t keep talking as your face scrunched up and your throat tightened and you started crying. It took a moment, but you calmed down enough to continue. “I had been so afraid that it could be true. And that night, I couldn’t sleep ‘cause I didn’t know what to do. But it was you and you were comfortable. And I felt safe, I guess.”

You stopped. There wasn’t more you could say as your body started shaking in the silent tears that had begun to fall. It felt awful. And through your blurry vision, all you could see was Javi staring at you. 

You could imagine what was going through his head. How he must be disgusted. How he must hate you. How he might not ever want to talk to you again.

“I’m sorry,” you sobbed, your voice barely above a whisper. You swung your legs down, your hands coming to either side of you to push yourself up. “I can drive back to Houston tonight if you don’t want to see me again, I underst—”

“No. Stay,” Javi interrupted you. “Please don’t go.”

You looked back at him, blinking away enough of the tears to see him. He looked scared and uncomfortable in his body language, but his eyes? They were filled with something much warmer, and they were looking right at you.

You lowered back down onto the bench. 

“On May 7th, 1986” he started, and you looked back at him. “You sent me a letter. It took a while to reach me, and it took me even longer to write back. But that was the first letter you told me about your… partner. And you had crossed out a word. You wrote ‘I want you to meet’ and then there was this scribble, and then the word _them_ . And I could barely make out, underneath the pen, that you had written _her_. And I read that letter every day, sometimes more than once, for the three weeks it took for me to write back. And then I kept it. It was on my bedside table for years. I stared at that one little sentence for months.”

You swallowed. “I thought you wouldn’t have been able to read underneath that.”

“I’m glad I could, though. It made me hate myself a little less. Even if it wasn’t true, though, I would sit there thinking that if you could even think to write that, and slip up, then being gay couldn’t have been that bad. And if you were? Then maybe I wasn’t such a horrible person for liking men. Because you could never be a bad person. Never.”

You didn’t know what to say. You looked at Javier and frowned. “So you’re saying you’re…”

“I’m gay. Too. I guess,” he said. And you gasped. All these years, and both of you had wound up queer. “I told you I left Lorraine because I was cheating. I wasn’t. But I had been with someone before her. And I loved him. A lot. But I hated myself because I was gay. I still do a bit I guess. But I projected it on him too. And he broke up with me for it. He told me that once I figured out how to love him without hating everything about us, we could try again. And I didn’t think that could ever happen. 

“I tried to marry Lorraine. I really did. I thought if I could just do it, then I could pretend it was all okay. But I couldn’t, in the end. I knew it was wrong. Both to her, and to myself,” Javier said. You were impressed that he managed to say all of it and not cry like you were. You wanted to lean over and hug him.

Instead, you reach out an arm and pulled him onto the bench next to you, resting your head down on his shoulder. 

“Who was he?” you asked.

“Remember when we had that Christmas dinner in ‘72 and you were back for the long break and I showed up late?”

You nodded.

“You could tell the minute I walked in I had been with someone. You were always good at reading me like that,” he said. “And you asked me if I liked her? Except it was a guy. Him. That was our first date. He went to Trinity University, up in San Antonio, and was back for the break, like us. We had met a few months before at a football game that my roommate’s girlfriend’s brother or something was playing at and we all drove up to. We were both from here and started talking, and then that morning during break we ran into each other at the supermarket. He took me out for lunch. It was my first date with a guy, I guess. And it, um,” he chuckled. “It ran a little overtime.”

###  **october 2000**

It was a warm evening and you were reclined on one of the seats on your back deck. Javi was next to you, looking better than you had ever seen him; his button-down was hanging mostly open and he had a look of half-contentment, half-drowsiness on his face. He had come so damn far.

You had been going on to him about your work, going from the recent data the Mars Global Surveyor had sent back to how amazing the interns you had over the summer had been. You knew when to stop with Javi, since he was very clear about when he was bored. But this? This was the relaxed way the two of you were able to talk. He liked hearing about it, even if to an onlooker he looked exhausted. Truthfully, it was relaxing. To both of you.

He and his partner (Javier hated the word ‘boyfriend’) had driven over for dinner with you and your partner (you didn’t hate the word ‘girlfriend,’ it just didn’t feel right for how long you had been together; if you could marry, she would be your wife) earlier that evening, and after a quiet backyard barbeque, the other two headed downtown for one of the preseason basketball games. 

It was one of those happy coincidences. You and Javi felt horrible in the beginning for doing things like double dates because it often turned into you and Javi leaving your partners to talk to each other when they hardly knew the other. But as soon as they discovered they could go to things like basketball and baseball games together and not have to drag you or Javi along, things had been smooth sailing. 

“You know,” Javi said, filling the silence from where you had trailed off. “When you said you wanted to be like Yuri Gagarin, I never thought you’d _actually_ join NASA.”

You chuckled. “I didn’t end up ever going up there though.”

“You could,” Javi said.

You shook your head. “No. I’ve seen what they have to do in training. I don’t think I could actually do it.”

“So you didn’t go up there, sure. But you helped put other people up there. And you literally discovered brand new things about the planets. About Mars. You were the one making the discoveries I was hearing about thousands of miles away while in Colombia, and no one ever said your name. That’s pretty damn impressive.”

“I guess,” you said, but you had a tight smile breaking out on your face. “The Mars Exploration Program plans are going to be announced soon. I want to tell you all about what we’re planning, and some of the things I’m in charge of, but it’ll have to wait another week or two.”

“I’m no stranger to government secrets,” Javi laughed.

“Yeah, but these ones aren’t _dangerous_ , they’re just… suspenseful.”

A drop of water landed on your forearm and you looked up at the sky. It had been clear just seconds ago. 

Another drop fell down on your arm, then two on your left leg, and then the sky just dumped everything down.

“Shit.” You stood up and ran into your house, Javi trailing behind. 

You opened the door and ducked inside just as it got louder. Luckily, you didn’t have anything else out that couldn’t get wet, having already brought everything from dinner in. The rain pattered against the windows and roof, and it was the only thing you could hear. 

You turned around to see Javi, who had gotten soaked, dripping onto the hardwood floor. He was shivering, and you didn’t blame him, what with the thin shirt and lightweight pants he was wearing. You laughed a bit and gestured for him to follow you down the hall to the bathroom. You took a towel down from the closet and got close enough to Javi so he could hear you instructing him to take a shower if he wanted, and you would grab some dry clothes. He slipped into the bathroom as you ran up to your bedroom. 

It was quieter up there, and you peeled off your own drenched clothes, pulling on a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt you no longer knew who it belonged to originally, your wardrobe having long become intertwined with your partners. 

You pulled another shirt down, something that looked like it would fit Javi, even though it would probably be a little too oversized for him, and then fished out some basketball shorts from the back of a drawer. They would have to do, even though the thought of Javi wearing what you had picked out made you laugh to yourself. 

If only his students at the university could see him as he was here, laid-back, casual, smiling, drinking beer while conversing with the neighbors during backyard parties. Himself. 

You knew it wasn’t his fault nor the kids’. A lot of them probably wouldn’t care. But the university might not have let Javier teach there if they knew he was gay. It was one of those things, where maybe the students could be queer, and student organizations were allowed, but for it to extend to the leadership or faculty was nearly unheard of. You had been able to do lectures in the area, but had been invited to some others across Texas and were never invited back to many after word got around that you were ‘a supposed homosexual,’ as one apology letter had stated. 

Down in the living room, you set down the clothes next to you on the couch and curled up, waiting for Javi to let you know he needed you.

You could hear the shower running and were glad he was comfortable enough to do that at your home. Your cat popped out from underneath the plush armchair she liked to hide under and meowed loudly before jumping up to sit next to you. As you ran your hand down her back, she made a little excited purr and flopped down, exposing her stomach and side. 

Unfortunately, it happened just as the shower shut off. You stood up and walked over to the bathroom, knocking on the door. It opened a few inches and Javi’s face peeked out from behind. You handed him the clothes. 

“I don’t know if they’ll fit, you’ll probably be swimming in them,” you said. 

“It’s fine. Thank you.”

It wasn’t really fine. Javi joined you in the living room, and you couldn’t help but laugh. A t-shirt and basketball shorts was as far from his style as you could possibly get. He looked like every male athlete on TV, and on top of that, everything was a little too big.

“Where’d you get these clothes?” he asked, laughing along with you.

“The shorts are hers, from when she played basketball.”

“Oh,” he said.

“It’s what I had. I don’t think you’d want to be wearing any of our pants, so…” You smiled.

Javi sat down on the opposite side of the couch from you, and the cat crawled over to him. curling up on his lap and purring loud enough you could hear it. Having always been a dog person growing up, Javi wasn’t initially comfortable coming over to your house and having the cat rub up against him. He hated her claws and the fur she shed. But over time, he had warmed up to her, slowly beginning to scratch her under her chin and let her bump into his legs. It took a few years, but he finally let her sit in his lap, and the two had become instant friends since. 

You didn’t often want Javi to leave some nights, just because the cat would make a racket when she realized he was gone. 

“How’ve things been with him?” you asked Javi.

“Good, I guess,” Javi shrugged. “We’ve had the house for a year now and the neighbors have finally stopped asking questions. But I think he wishes we had chosen a more welcoming neighborhood. It’s not ideal.”

You nodded. It was clear that it was so much harder for Javi. You and your partner both worked at NASA and had been able to pull off being roommates in a convenient neighborhood next to the space center. Javi, on the other hand, worked far from the university but close to the hospital his partner worked at. It hadn’t been as easy to hide. 

“But we’re doing well. I’m still not sure how to do some of this, but it’s better than whatever the hell I was doing before,” Javi continued. “He’s really patient, and I’m happy that he was able to forgive me for all those years ago.”

You had helped him find a job at one of the universities in Houston after Javi had come back. He had moved into a small apartment downtown, and you would take him to places where he could be out, like the gay bars and things. It took some time, but you could see him figuring out how to accept himself.

And along the way, you found your friendship strengthening. No longer were you both keeping huge secrets from one another. You could laugh about your dating history without feeling like it was a forbidden topic, and you started to spend more time together. It was a sharp change from being so distant from everyone, that your scant friendship meant the two of you were still best friends after college and before Javi left for Colombia. You were able to actually be best friends. Real ones. 

You managed to come out to your family back in Laredo, and while they weren’t accepting, Chucho and most of the rest of the Peña’s were. That had paved the way for Javi to come out a year later. In the meantime, Javi ran into his old boyfriend again, and after finding out he also lived in Houston, they decided to give it a go. 

They had been dating for three and a half years now and had moved in together the year before. 

Unfortunately, things weren’t getting easier in Texas.

Just a few months ago, one of your friends was arrested with his boyfriend after they had been caught having sex in their apartment. They were only fined, but the night they both spent in a holding cell had been harrowing. You had been the one to pick them up the next morning, and they ended up spending a few nights in the guest room at your place. 

The two were still friends, but you knew it had become hard for them to even spend the night alone together, the memory of that night seared into their brains. 

It was a cause for concern for all of you. Javi had developed a severe anxiety for a few weeks, the reality of the anti-sodomy laws crashing down hard around him, and nearly everyone in your circles had retreated almost into the closet for a while. You were in a conservative enough neighborhood to not be so public where you lived, but you were still scared to even walk downtown holding hands with your partner. It was awful. 

“Do you think you’re actually going to go up to Vermont?” Javi asked. 

You were taken aback by the question. Back in July, Vermont began issuing civil unions. You had talked about going up and doing it, just for the symbolism of it all. It wouldn’t be recognized in Texas, but you had been living with your partner for almost fifteen years. Enough to want it. But after about a month of talk, the two of you both dropped the subject. 

“I don’t know,” you said. “I think we’d like to, but we both know it’s not gonna do much. We still live in Texas.”

“You don’t have to let that stop you. You never have in the past.”

“I guess.” You looked down at your lap. There was something you had been meaning to tell Javi for a while now and you weren’t sure how to break it to him. It was the reason you weren’t going to spend the money to go up to Vermont. “Javi, my research with NASA? And the Mars Exploration Program? It’s all being headed at the Jet Propulsion Lab. In California.”

You looked up to see him staring at you. And your heart sank. You could tell he knew what was coming, and you didn’t want to hurt him again. Still. “They want me to move there.”

In Javi’s eyes, you could see him processing it all. You had been talking it over for a while with your partner, and it had all fallen into place. It wouldn’t happen for another seven or eight months, but you were planning on saying yes in the next week or two. The only thing was how unfair it was to Javi. You didn’t want to leave him behind.

“But what about…” he started before trailing off. You knew what he meant.

“She’s always had the option to work in the offices there, and they’d appreciate her being that much closer to Goldstone,” you said. She already visited the Deep Space Communications Complex a few times a year, and for her to be there more often would be a lot better. 

“Oh.”

“Javi, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. We were just figuring it all out, and I wasn’t sure how to tell you.”

“Don’t apologize,” he said, straightening up. Something appeared to have clicked in him, and he dropped the lost demeanor. “That’s great. For both of you.”

“I don’t want to leave you behind, Javi,” you said. That’s what you were afraid of. You had been so distant for so long and had just reunited. Maybe leaving wasn’t the right idea.

“You’re not,” he said. “You’re doing something for _you_.”

“But—”

“No buts,” Javi said. “We’ll visit. Probably a lot. And my dad’s gonna demand you come back for Christmas every year anyway. It won’t be like when I was in Colombia. We can call each other. And email now.”

“Right,” you said. “I guess I’m scared of living without you always around. Things have always been better when you’re here.”

Javi pushed the cat off of his lap, and she jumped off the couch and ran over and up into the armchair. He reached over to grab your arm and pull you in next to him, wrapping one of his arms around your shoulders. 

“It’s going to be fine. You’ve always been stronger than me,” he said. “You sure as hell don’t need me here.”

You laughed. “I’m not stronger than you. You’ve fought off Narcos on the roofs of Bogotá or something.”

“Sure, but I wasn’t out to people in Texas in the 70s.”

“It would have been better if I was out to you too,” you said. That was something you now had come to regret. Knowing Javi wouldn’t have cared, you just think about all the years you had missed out on. 

“The good thing,” he said, “Is that no one’s giving up hope here. Things will get so much better. And California is probably leagues ahead. But we’ll be fine. And you’ll be fine.”

“Thank you, Javi,” you said. 

“Thank _you_. There’s one reason why my life’s taken the turns it has, to here, to someplace so much happier than I’ve ever been. And that’s you. You’re not leaving me. We’re always going to be friends. If history has shown us anything, it’s that.”


End file.
